ROLE: The school as a knowing organization - Knowledge management as a strategy for continuous teacher development

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Organizations have knowledge. The knowledge is typically dispersedthroughout the organization. Some of it is codified in documents andpolicies, some is embodied in projects and strategies, and some is tacitlyheld by individuals and small groups. The problem of knowledge managementis that an organization's knowledge is often locally produced, haphazardlydisseminated, and ineffectively indexed. It is inaccessible when and whereit is needed. Knowledge management techniques take a participatory approachto identifying, codifying, and integrating knowledge resources throughoutthe organization. Their objective is to help people make sense of theirorganizations, to develop and maintain trust, to make commitments and takeresponsibility, to more effectively challenge, negotiate, and learn, andthereby to improve the quality of the contributions people make to theirorganizations.This project will adapt knowledge management concepts and techniques, andthe information technology they employ, to understand and enhance knowledgemanagement in school organizations. We will work with schooladministrators, but chiefly with teachers. First, we will investigate andcharacterize knowledge management practices as they exist today, andidentify needs and opportunities to improve knowledge management. We willfacilitate teacher-initiated development of organizational knowledgeresources, and identify, and accessibly codify the critical knowledge ofthe school systems.We will assess the impact of this intervention on teachers, on the schoolsystem, and on the perception of the school by the community. We willcompare and contrast this analysis and intervention to knowledge managementinterventions now becoming typical in business organizations.